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I appreciate that! Yeah, I can see how the plain background could be kind of boring, thanks for the feedback!

Means a lot, thanks for playing!

Hey, that's true, we had a similar mechanic! I already left a comment on your game, but I think your inclusion of an upgrade tree was a great idea! As for my game, yeah, maybe I didn't increment the difficulty enough between levels. Right now it's a pretty slow burn, so it doesn't start to get more interesting until around level 5 where you really have to chase down the targets... but most players were probably checked out before then, especially since it's a jam and there's lots of other games to play, haha. Glad you enjoyed it, though, and I appreciate your honest thoughts!

Those are good points, I think you're right that some balancing and more incentives could make it more interesting. Thank you for playing!

Thank you for your kind words! Yeah sorry, I can see how it might be confusing at first without a tutorial (I originally wanted to make one), but I'm glad you were able to figure it out!

You're right, the gameplay is very Snake-like (but brighter, haha), and thanks for letting me know how to improve, knowing when exactly you started to get bored is great feedback!

"You Are Lost And Isolated" -- why does your game have to call me out like that? Nah, but really though, I guess I'm not cut out to be a migratory species. You got some decent core gampelay, there, although a tad unforgiving. Maybe if there was some way to know a bit earlier when an obstacle was coming. I mean, eagles have really good vision, right? Fish, I don't know... but catfish can detect electrical pulses with their whiskers. Could they detect sea mines with those? Speaking of biological accuracy, I think it was pretty ambitious of you to make it so players can choose between two separate species! Although it was way harder for birds with the wingspan catching drones and what not. I thought the animation for the flapping wings and swimming looked pretty good. Anyway, the idea of falling behind the flock/school was a good fit for the theme. They definitely left me behind without a second thought. Nature sure is scary.

You managed to get a lot out of the one-button mechanics! Nice idea to augment the casting by how long you hold space. There wasn't a lot to it once you see how that and the reeling minigame works, but I think there's something to be said for keeping things simple. Was there any difference in the difficulty based on the size and/or speed of the fish? If there was, I couldn't tell, so maybe making the difference more obvious would be one way to improve. I liked the pixel art and the music, definitely brought an old-school feel. I could imagine a bored kid that was dragged along with the family to a remote a fishing lodge for tourists finding this game cartridge in a dusty cabinet that hasn't been opened since the mid '80s and firing up the old tube TV in the dark, musty den to play it while the others are frittering away at the lake.

Hey, if this is your first game, I think it's actually quite ambitious! There's a bug where the game freezes, so I guess it's not possible to finish it, and I couldn't figure out how to get more power for the rest of the georadars after starting the generator, and I couldn't find a way to get inside the house... But I think I kind of understood what you were going for, even if it's not complete. The snowy setting did feel isolated, and the sound of wind and the polar bears in the woods added to that feeling of being all alone with no one to help. I think you can definitely take what you learned with this project and make a solid puzzle-adventure game in the future! Keep going and good luck!

Wow, you nailed the feeling of "isolation" on an emotional level. I mean, what a life this guy's living! The constant dread of something falling out of balance was palpable, and yet all that effort was just to maintain a pretty sorry state of affairs. It made me think about my own life in ways I don't want to admit. I've never seen manually pulling water through a plant's veins as a game mechanic before, but it somehow felt very bleak, as did having to pluck thorns just to get something to eat. Loved the storybook illustration-like visuals and the moody music, all working together to set the tone. I think maybe the letters could've had less text and more frequency to parcel out the story over time, but it was an interesting idea to include a sort of diary. Also, this is a small nitpick, but I think your logotype for the game title doesn't really match the mood of the game itself (maybe it was meant ironically?). Overall, a unique take on the theme!

I like chill games like this where there's just enough of a feeling of progression to keep you going! It's a difficult balance, but I think you made a smart design choice by using the upgrades to make gameplay changes visible to the player, and tying it to an in-game currency gave an added sense of reward. I definitely preferred using mouse controls because it was more responsive. I think keyboard controls could've worked if the ouroboros moved as fast that way as could be achieved with the mouse, but maybe you tried that and it was unwieldy, so I don't know. It was short and I can see how you could keep developing the concept, but it felt complete for a jam game, nice work!

Ah, clever, it did take me a sec to figure out what to do, but honestly you gave all the clues needed. For some reason seeing the NPCs wiggling around outside the walls was funny to me. Also, chasing the "friend" around the room to give a hug, I could imagine the character shouting "let me love you!" At first I thought maybe a tiny bit more effort could've been put into the one character sprite since it was used a lot, but now I think it wasn't such a deal as the lo-fi aesthetic has its own charm and makes sense for a small jam game. A quick puzzle with some nice ideas!

Neat idea to go with the theme! I liked the pixel art and the overall presentation. For me, something felt a little off about the game balancing, especially in the first level. Maybe it would have helped if the aphids moved a tad slower at first? Or allow the player to move faster? However, as I got better with the controls, I managed to find better ways to defeat them, so maybe the difficulty curve is alright. I know this is probably beyond the scope of what you could have done for the jam, but if you were to continue past two levels, I can see some potential for progression like facing more and stronger enemies while also allowing the player to have a faster rate of fire. There were some funny (perhaps unintentional?) moments, like when the aphids got stuck behind trees it looked like they were trying hide and sneak around. Also, if you die when the plant still has a lot of health, you can only lay there helplessly as the aphids wreck the poor little plant until the game over screen comes. Anyway, nice work!

I have a lot of respect for this kind of minimalist storytelling. I thought the design choices you made were effective at getting the feeling of "isolation" across quickly, like the beginning where everything reminds Ned of Heather, and the montage of moments showing the relationship deteriorating. The choice you gave the player of whether or not to move on was poignant; maybe this is the choice we all face in our lives. I played through the "good" ending first, and it was nice to see Ned had such a supportive work environment. I was surprised at first when the choice to not move on simply ends the game, but actually that's great symbolism: either you make the choice to move on or it's game over. I liked the addition of the quotes, as well.

In terms of technical things: one feature I would have liked is to have the option to use arrow keys, since I prefer that to WASD when I'm not using the mouse. Also, there were a few cases where the sprite render order seemed off, like things that should have been behind were in front or vice versa. Also, there seems to be no way to exit the game during gameplay. It would be nice if the escape key could at least bring up a pause menu or something that has the option to exit.

Overall a simple story, but gave me some things to think about. Keep at it, I see a lot of potential!

A simple game, but a core game loop is there, so it counts! Nice music track, although it seems almost too epic for the scale of the game, haha. I guess I can see a bit of the theme being used there, too: it must be lonely when it seems like everything in the world is out to get you, and all you can do is avoid... 

Aww, didn't see the ending coming, but it hit, nice one! I thought the simple character designs and environments were rather endearing. Definitely felt a sense of foreboding and melancholy throughout, and the music helped with that. The dialogue was funny, it very quickly gave you sense of the personalities of the family members. Even though they were eccentric (and ghosts, haha), you get the impression that the kid was loved and taken care of, so when they all disappeared it did feel like a loss. Then the fourth wall break from the detective was a good segue into questioning the reality before the reversal at the end. The font was a little hard to read at times, and also it might have been good to have a visual indicator of where to go up the stairs, but other than that the gameplay was smooth, quick, and to the point. Good work!

Hello! I have a game that I wasn't able to complete in time for another jam, but the concept happens to match the plant/nature theme! Would it be ok to finish it up and submit it here? Just so you know, I only worked on it for maybe 3-4 days so far, so it wouldn't be exceeding the time restrictions.

Thank you for the kind feedback! It's encouraging that you think the game could be expanded more, and that's an interesting idea for the controls that I hadn't considered!

Thank you for playing! You're right, it is hard! At the time I submitted the game, I actually wasn't sure if there was any way to get all 10 balls in the goal. However, today I finally managed to do it for the first time, so now I feel better knowing that it's possible! 😅

Thank you so much!

Thank you, glad you liked it! I agree with you about those improvements! I really did want to add in a few more things to polish it, but, as you probably guessed, I just ran out of time for the jam and submitted this version.

One interesting thing I discovered in playing it is that, because of the way the physics works, the balls that get stuck can continue to very slowly squeeze through tight spaces. I discovered this after stepping away from my laptop and, right as I walked back in, a ball got dislodged and fell into the goal. So I almost wonder if putting a replay button in would end the game prematurely? Although I think most people playing a "20-second" game wouldn't have the patience to wait an hour for a ball to get unstuck 😄

Hey now, don't get discouraged!

First of all, this jam wasn't about finding the "best" game -- I mean the scoring categories were things like "body" and "soul"... what do those even mean? I think it was more about the vibes and celebrating creativity. Game jams are places to experiment, after all!

Secondly -- even if it was about finding the best game... that's totally subjective and everyone has different ideas of what "best" means for them. Sure, some might have rated your game lower because it wasn't for them, but that's ok! Even the most popular games have people that don't like them at all (look at Fortnite, for example). The important thing is that it looks like some people who played it *do* like the type of game you made, so make your games for them! Those are your people, and they want to see what you do next!

You clearly have talent for game dev, so keep creating and keep putting your stuff out there!

I wasn't sure what I was expecting from the cover art, but that first track really set the tone. Nice mix of tunes! From jazzy to exotic to contemplative, it felt like listening to the soundtrack of a long lost Sega Saturn puzzle-platformer.

Hey, not bad! Pretty classic gameplay, and the sprites looked good for the theme. It might've been nice to have a few additional types of obstacles or something every now and then, but the core gameplay loop was there. It might be a good idea to explicitly say somewhere that the A and D keys are used for controls (even just in the description on the game page), or maybe also allow input from the arrow keys and/or mouse, since those are also commonly used. Overall simple but solid, keep practicing!

Nice art, I could see it fitting well in a game! Also, I think you made some smart choices in simplifying the shapes while still having the details of each growth stage be readable. One bit of feedback I could offer is that something about the timing of the animation makes it seem like the plants are "dancing" of their own volition rather than swaying in the wind, but maybe that was intentional? Not a big deal in any case.

Interesting idea! I think using games for personal reflection like this is a cool use of the medium. The art style did give a strong nostalgic feeling, and there were a lot of unique details that actually made me take notice of some of the stuff in my own desk space that I usually don't even acknowledge because I've gotten used to them being there. I guess it's only when we go through some sort of change that those things we've taken for granted are visible again. I wasn't sure if this was the case, but did all the items packed up in the box show up in the next space you moved to? I think I packed a lot of trash without really thinking about it 😅. Just from a technical standpoint, I know this is probably not on you and more on Unity, but it seems insane for a small game like this to need almost 600 MB of space, unzipped. Again though, I'm not familiar with the norms for Unity, so maybe that's just the overhead required, but perhaps there's some way to optimize it further? In any case, this was a chill and evocative game!

Cute VN, had nice vibes throughout! I thought the pixel art was used effectively, mixing the look of DOS-era games with the Celtic fantasy theme and simplified anime-like designs. Kudos for going all out with the voice acting -- it sounded like everyone was really committed to conveying the personalities of the characters and it added a lot to the warm tone of the story.

Nice puzzle game concept! It's cool that you added customization options and a level editor, as well. I think that what is currently the 4x speed should be the default (like make that 1x speed and allow the player to go slower if they want). Oh, at some point I accidentally pressed a button and entered some sort of debug mode and couldn't get back out of it. There's a few other areas I could point out for extra polish, like the countdown timer for each step showing a trailing decimal instead of just rounding to the nearest second, but those kinds of things didn't affect the game experience.

I like the art style a lot, and I actually think you should use the in-game graphics for your thumbnail and such because the colors and aesthetic are more appealing to my eye. I couldn't help but laugh at how over the top the songs were, but they did fit the theme! 😂

Overall, fun and pretty complete for a game jam!

Interesting space to explore, lots of atmosphere and old-school FPS vibes. Good job keeping the style pretty consistent throughout. Seeing the huge monster behind the metal bars was a cool moment. Throwing the discs felt a bit off to me, so making that snappier might be a quick win. Also the tutorial/instructions page was a bit cryptic, but I understand that might have been intentional, haha.

Just to follow up on the audio thing, it does look like I somehow muted the game, probably by accidentally pressing 0 on the numpad since it's pretty close to the right arrow on my laptop. Now I can listen to that nice music again 🎵

Very cool game and a good example of keeping things simple! I'm digging (no pun intended) the tasteful choices here with the pixel art and chiptune music. Combined with the clear, straightforward gameplay loop, all those elements came together to create a pretty complete, consistent experience. I think the obstacles like the bats and big rocks that can fall on you (as I learned the hard way) provided some good challenge. I also liked the idea of using stuff you mined to buy power-ups, and that they were randomized so you never quite knew what you might be able to get. That shop part also gives a nice breather between clearing areas. If you wanted to keep developing the game further, there are perhaps more obstacles, abilities, etc. that could be added to keep things interesting for longer play cycles and added replay value -- but I think you did plenty given the time constraints of the jam. Nice work!

I like the chill vibe of this game and the character design and animation are nice! It took me a little while to get the hang of it, but I can see what you were going for with the puzzles, and I actually think there's a lot of potential with the plant/fungi-growing mechanics! It took me an embarrassingly long time to get through the third stage (I kept trying to make it work by putting the mushroom on top of the tree, lol), but I eventually got it. The fifth stage was showing some promise, and I think I figured out what I needed to do, but unfortunately I ran into a game-breaking bug where for some reason the game would freeze and it wouldn't take any input from the keyboard or mouse. It might have to do with activating the "Look Around" mode, or launching plants while in that mode, but sometimes it did work without issue, so I don't know. I restarted the game a few times and kept running into the same problem. Also, perhaps even more strangely, after the first time I encountered this bug, the sound and music stopped working, and then they somehow stayed off even when I refreshed the page and reloaded the game.

Anyway, I don't know if it was just me, but I thought I'd mention it. Overall, very cute game, I like the idea of carrying a rose to your loved one (on your head, haha) being the main goal, and there's some solid, classic puzzle-platformer mechanics in there! 

Very nice game mechanics and polished level design for the timeframe! You managed to do a lot with the simplicity of the one-button controls. I thought the progression in difficulty and the introduction of new abilities was very thoughtful and well-balanced. I've been trying to learn more about game design lately, and based on some things I've seen about the "metroidvania" genre, I'm wondering if this qualifies as one? I think it does at least partially, since you have the exploration gated by new abilities aspect. I definitely was not prepared for the blood particle effects and metal music, but they were hilarious! 

This is quite polished and well-executed! You did a lot to give each song unique visuals and animations, and I dig the art style. The gameplay felt tight, and adding calibration for the offset was a nice touch. I would have liked to see a breakdown of my score between songs and maybe again at the end, but I totally get that in the time crunch of a jam you can't necessarily fit in everything you want, and there's a lot there already!

Also, you made these tracks yourself? Absolute bangers, every one, and I see what you did incorporating the theme into the song lyrics. 🎵

Just enough mini-games in there to have some nice variety and a lot of fun takes on the theme! Also the soundtrack fit just right.

Neat take on traversal and resource management mechanics. The mind-blowing thing I was realizing as I was playing is that real life plant roots probably engage in similar kinds of "decisions" when pushing through the soil (there's interesting research on that, look up the "root-brain hypothesis" for more info). So yeah, really great job capturing the theme, and it's educational, too!

Really interesting take on the theme! I admire game mechanics with this kind of elegant simplicity. I ended up not doing very well in my first go-round (83 clicks, haha). Finding the right strategy might be like exiting the Matrix, so I might need to spend some time meditating on it. "Be one with the root..."

Wow, that's some wild lore, and it's impressive you managed to make a full opening cut-scene! I like the art style and that rotating planet is quite iconic. Obviously it would've been a lot to get all those RPG mechanics in there for a game jam, but you've set up the structure for a lot of interesting systems, so this could be the beginning of something great!

Also, just for future reference, there's a weird bug where if you come out of full screen and then open it in full screen again, the game gets rendered in a tiny square. It confused me for a bit before I refreshed and reloaded, which fixed it.

Nice prototype! This idea of a platformer where you can stack your own platforms is a core mechanic that could be used in many interesting ways! I noticed that you can sort of "stick" to the plants and wall-jump off of them, which is also a neat feature that gives the gameplay more depth!

The intro part felt very cinematic! I like how you showed where the title came from, and the creepy music set the tone. It's a cool idea to play as a fungus and the controls felt good, but even after following along the tutorial I wasn't really able to figure out how to get more nutrients or what the goals were. I was going through it quickly, though, so it could be my fault for missing it. The mechanic has a lot of potential and I think the idea could be expanded more!